How do you think schools should punish children?

[MaryMaryVeryContrary]

A lot of ‘school refusal’ and problems in education is associated with poor behaviour from other pupils on here. Yet whenever a poster’s child is reprimanded they seem outraged and feel the teacher is picking on their DC for no reason. They often think the (perfectly reasonable sounding) punishment is too harsh, or their child should’ve had more warnings.

So I’m interested in how you think schools should actually discipline pupils, taking into account this also means your own DC?

Violence:

in senior school should be immediate permanent exclusion.

In infants should be 3 strikes and you’re out- as small children make mistakes.

In upper juniors 2 strikes and you are out.

SEN should not be an exception but should mean that help is put into place to find a child a more appropriate setting. Not excuses and keep them in the same setting!

My child was punched, kicked, bitten from age 3-9 by a child with SEN. Nothing was done and excuses were made, then the perpetrator was excluded with no explanation.

If the above policy had been in place the perpetrator would have been excluded age 4, meaning a much more appropriate setting at a younger age. Plus less bruises for my child!

I have to say that this would be beneficial for all pupils. The daily mile is a great idea. Many of my SEN pupils benefit from physical activity but not just at the start of the day, but multiple times throughout the day. Sadly, for many classes with just one teacher and no additional support, it’s simply not doable.

I didn’t say they were linked, but they are perfectly equivalent. It’s not ‘SEN bashing’ to say that if a SEN child is being violent they put others at harm is it? It’s a very straightforward FACT!

Actually, this is the group that I have no idea how to help. The ones who on paper should be coping with school, should be engaged, have the intelligence and parents in good jobs, but the entitlement wipes it all out.
The only way of helping those ones is to get them away from their parents, but you can’t…

Not one sentence in this post is true. It is possible to permanently exclude a child. Violence is not through the roof. The lack of attainment in schools has nothing to do with school refusal.

School refusal is most often because of a schools failure to properly support children with additional needs. If anyone needs to be punished for that, it's the schools. And in our area they are putting more and more children with complex ASN in mainstream school and reducing the number of support staff available. That's the real problem.

"Another SEN bashing thread. Hope you are all feeling better now getting it off your chests whilst getting cheered on by the equally ignorant. Some of these comments are horrible."

And they all think they are immune to having a child with needs themselves. Easier to 'other' than accept it could have been their child they are talking about.

I think it’ll go full circle. Poor parenting by some is part of the problem. Neurodiverse is now the blanket term for the acceptance of poor behaviour and lack of boundaries.

Why should schools be punished? The level of need is so high they have no hope of meeting it.

I must add, there are genuine SEN cases but everyone seems to be, at the minute, so how can anyone determine what is what?!

Ok I admit it, I think there was possibly 1 permanent exclusion in Scotland last year. But how many kids were hospitalised through assault in school? More than that I’d guess.

Gently, the attempted suicide rate amongst autistic people is 35% vs 10.5% in the rest of the population. I don’t think forcing kids to mask because they’ve been forced into an education setting that doesn’t meet their needs will help lower those rates.

When they get to work they’ll absolutely be able to request reasonable adjustments, what’s so unreasonable about expecting the same of schools?

For non violent children:
Infants: rainbow chart will the bottom colours meaning parent is called in for a chat.
Juniors: as above plus a reward scheme for good behaviour- stickers etc.
There should be no reward/ punishment scheme for work in primary, only behaviour.

In secondary.
Reward scheme for work in whatever way seems fit. In my son’s school good work gets a “merit”. The number of “merits” in a year leads to certificates presented at assembly.

Behaviour scheme is separate and is for all negative behaviours including not being on time or ready to work. 3 demerits = detention. Any more and your parents meet with the head of year.

There’s only one thing on this list that my DS doesn’t receive every day at school. They are truly amazing at making school a place that he is able to cope with (ASD/ADHD).

I have looked at special schools, as has the current headteacher, but he isn’t deemed to be at the threshold for needing one as he can manage mainstream with all of the above in place.

Please tell me what you think should happen? A violent SEN child (and the vast majority of SEN children are OBVIOUSLY not violent) is kept in a mainstream classroom to assault others, or they are removed? What exactly do you want to happen? I don’t understand.

But - and I appreciate it’s a difficult question - what about the other children? Is it fair to them?

Scottish school exclusion statistics:

https://www.gov.scot/publications/summary-statistics-for-schools-in-scotland-2023/pages/exclusions/

violence in Scotland’s schools is very widely reported. Most teachers face violence or agrees iIn on a daily basis. Are you ok with that? Are you ok with your children witnessing that?

https://www.tes.com/magazine/news/general/violence-schools-scotland-behaviour

Exactly. In my school over maybe the last 6-7 years we have created pretty much a whole new department to support pupils, with new staffing posts to cope . And still the numbers of difficult pupils get bigger and bigger , as the others see a whole group of pupils who get to not go to lessons, and cook or play games all day . We are not doing these pupils any favours.

It is Sen bashing to blame bad behaviour in schools at the feet of children with Sen (or looked after children or those with mental health problems or anxiety). Read the thread. People are referring to those with bad behaviour as being the children with Sen and then extoling the virtues of the vanishingly rare alternatives to mainstream education and that's what I have a problem with. Bad behaviour is bad behaviour so why do so many people feel the need to qualify it with these stereotypes. I don't see anyone qualifying their posts by referring to violence acts by someone without Sen when clearly that happens but apparently not on mumsnet

Send them home to their parents, who more often than not teach no discipline and expects no one should discipline their children.

No one is obliged to tolerate them, as no one will at work or in the wider society.

I'm not sending my child to school to be abused, and no teacher/otherwise should be expected to tolerate abuse at work.

3 strikes and you are out rule, just expel. The problem is whilst I acknowledge that the children doing these things may be vulnerable, they are not getting an education anyway and aren’t really benefiting from being there.

But what they are doing is also making sure the education other children receive is worse and makes the school feel unsafe.

I think we’ve elevated the needs of the individual above the needs of the group as a society and we’ve gone too far. Theres a bloody good reason for accommodating individuals outside of the norm but we have to draw the line somewhere. Violence and persistent disruption are good reasons to exclude.

The Afghan who persistently committed sexually motivated crimes (I think it was exposure) who couldn’t be deported because apparently he was still behaving inappropriately towards women and would 100% get himself in trouble and the Taliban would probably do something to him. No consideration of the consequences that would have to then be bourne by all the girls and women who come across him.

The TRA’s who’s individual feelings are worth upending womens sex based rights, desire of a male to enter a female prison is more important than the impact on the group of women who will have to put up with them.

As a society we give primacy to the minority and neglect the impact they have on much larger groups. As I said theres a very understandable reason why that view has spread through our institutions but there is no recognition of how harmful it can be to others in society.

It seems to me (I’m not a teacher so do correct me) that there IS actually a lot of support for SEN in primaries, it’s just the expectation increases every time more is done for these children so nothing ever seems enough - plus the numbers of children with SEN rise and the spectrum of need increases?

I know . It makes me sad to see young people with so much potential and their whole lives ahead of them wasting their school years .

I agree, and apologise. I missed your nuance.

I see the bring back hanging brigade are out in force.
Do you seriously think that children who are persistently disruptive actually want to be in school and will be unhappy to be excluded?
Has anyone met a child who was excluded and it was overturned? My DS was 8 and one week when he was permanently excluded after one term of up to 5 1:1s per week and no, he was not reinstated even after the school were found guilty of disability discrimination.
Children with ADHD are 8x more likely to be permanently excluded. ASD is 5x.
What do you think happens after children are permanently excluded?
Parents say suddenly "oh my, he's been so badly behaved, he must stop" "yes mum I'll be a little angel"?
Get real.